3 . One day, a woman walked into a pet store to buy a bird for her Thanksgiving Day party. The guy said, “We only have one parrot. But I think you do not want it because it can talk…” The woman said happily, “That’s great. I’ve always wanted a talking bird.” So the guy said, “Since you are a nice lady, I’ll give it to you as a gift.”

And the lady went home and put the bird on her bed and walked out of the room. But as soon as she walked into the kitchen, the bird started to speak dirty words as loud as it could. The woman walked back into the room thinking, “I can’t have this at my party!” So she took the bird and put it in the fridge. A few hours later, while the woman was eating, she remembered that her bird was still in the fridge. Quickly, she opened the door and found it was shivering. Then she took out the bird at once. She said to the bird, “I’ll keep you out of there if you don’t use that language again. Do you agree with me?”

The bird nodded and asked, “Can I just ask a quick question?” The lady nodded and said, “Yes, you may.” The bird pointed at the turkey behind him and asked, “What did he do?”

4 . Why do plants grow in some places and not in others? Why does some land have so much growing on it, while other land has almost no plants growing on it at all?

To grow, plants need several things. One is warmth. In very cold places almost nothing grows. Plants also need water. In very dry parts of the Earth only a few unusual plants can grow. That’s why dry deserts everywhere are almost not covered by trees or grass.

Plants must also have a place in which to put down their roots and grow. They find it difficult to grow on hard land. The town is built on hard land. The plants here have only the soil found between the cracks of the stones to grow in.

Another thing plants must have before they can grow is food.

What will happen if we try to make things grow on the sandy beach? A few plants, such as beach grass, will grow in sand, but most plants won’t. Even if the weather is warm enough and we water the plants each day, many of them will die because the sand on this beach has almost no food for plants.

6 . If the eyes are the romantic’s window into the soul, then the teeth are an anthropologist’s (人类学家) door to the stomach.

In a study published last month in the journal Science, Peter Ungar of the University of Arkansas and his partner, Matt Sponheimer of the University of Colorado, US, examined the teeth of our early human ancestors to find out what they were really eating.

They already knew that different foods cause different marks on teeth. Some cause scratches, while others cause pits (坑).The carbon left on teeth by different foods is also different. Tropical grasses, for example, leave one kind of carbon, but trees leave another kind because they photosynthesized (光合作用) differently.

Traditionally, scientists had looked at the size and shape of teeth and skulls (头骨) to figure out what early humans ate. Big flat teeth were taken to be signs that they ate nuts and seeds, while hard and sharp teeth seemed good for cutting meat and leaves. But this was proven wrong.

The best example was the Paranthropus (傍人), one of our close cousins, some of which lived in eastern Africa. Scientists used to believe Paranthropus ate nuts and seeds because they had big crests(突起) on their skulls, suggesting they had large chewing muscles and big teeth. If this had been true, their teeth should have been covered with pits like the surface of the moon. They would also have had a particular type of carbon on their teeth that typically comes from tree products, such as nuts and seeds.

However, when the two scientists studied the Paranthroupus, it turned out to have none of these characteristics. The teeth had a different kind of carbon, and were covered with scratches, not pits. This suggests they probably ate grass, not nuts and fruit stones. It was the exact opposite of what people had expected to find.

Carbon “foodprints” give us a completely new and different insight into what different species ate and the different environments they lived in. If a certain species had the kind of carbon on its teeth that came from grasses, it probably lived in a tropical grassland, for example.

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7 . If this 13-year-old American boy succeeds in climbing Mount Everest, he has modest ambitions—pick a small piece of rock from the top as a memento and wears it in a necklace. “I will not sell it. It is something for myself to say ‘this is a rock from the top’,” Jordan Romero from California, told reporters in Kathmandu. He left for the mountain on Sunday.

If he succeeds, Romero will become the youngest climber to climb the 8,850 meters Everest Summit. Currently a 16-year-old Nepali boy, Temba Tsheri Sherpa, holds the record of being the world’s youngest climber of Mount Everest.

But Romero, sitting over lunch with his climbing father and stepmother in Kathmandu’s tourist district of Thamel, said he was not after setting climbing records. Romero said Mount Qomolangma that runs across Nepal-China border was part of his goal to climb the highest mountains on all seven continents.

“It is just a goal,” he said confidently. “If I don’t succeed I am okay. I will try again.” Romero has already climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa and Mount McKinley in Alaska among others.

Romero’s father Paul said the boy was ready to take on the climb and understood the risk of climbing the giant mountain.

“I know it requires a lot of patience. I will remain patient. I want to stay safe and make right choice,” Romero said of his climb using the northeast ridge(山脊) route on the Chinese side of the mountain.

Over 4,000 climbers have reached the top of Mount Qomolangma since it was first climbed by New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary and Nepal’s Tenzing Norgay Sherpa in 1953. Romero said he wanted to climb the highest mountains in all 50 states in the US next. “It does not need to be after Qomolangma and could be in between.”

9 . Experts say that the ability of dogs to smell is one million times stronger than that of humans. With so much sniff (闻) power, it’s hardly surprising that they stick their heads out of car windows. They don’t care about the scenery. What they’re after are the smells.

When dogs put their faces into the wind, their upper lips and noses are sniffing, their eyes partly closed, and their ears folded back. It looks as if they’re enjoying themselves very much, but mainly they’re concentrating. It’s as though they’re closing down all the rest of their senses to concentrate on this one. Every dog loves to hang his head out of the window, and all dogs have an excellent sense of smell. This ability is increased when they are moving quickly, which is one reason that they take advantage of open car windows. It also probably makes them excellent hunters.

Smell is so important to dogs that they have two systems for it. One is in the nose, which consists of a huge amount of tissue (组织) with scent receptors (嗅觉感受器). This area takes up about 1/2 square inch in humans, but up to 20 square inches in some dogs. As air moves over the tissue, odor molecules (气味分子) reach the millions of scent receptors. The more air flowing there is, the better dogs smell. So they love to put their faces into the wind.

Dogs have a second system in their mouths, where a tiny pipe leads to Jacobson’s organ (犁鼻器). Its task is to catch different types of smells. Dogs depend on it to find the sources of smells.

People build bridges for a     1    (vary) of reasons. There are bridges built for cars to cross over rivers. There are also bridges for trains to use. In Washington State, there is a very     2    (usual) bridge ─ a bridge for squirrels.

Longview has a very busy street with many cars     3    (pass) it every day. Before the bridge was built, many squirrels     4    (run) over by cars when they tried to cross the street. A local builder, Amos Peters, wanted to protect these small and lovely animals. So in 1963, after getting    5    (permit) by the local government, he built a bridge for the squirrels, one     6     would let them pass above the traffic.

The bridge     7    (be) a symbol of the town since then. And every Christmas, the local people add a small Christmas tree     8     the center of the bridge.     9    , they raised more money to build two more bridges for those lovely animals. Thanks to the bridges, the squirrels are able to cross     10    (safe) from one side of the street to the other.